Going Dairy-Free (DF) – Part Two:My Dairy-free Journey

Going Dairy-Free (DF) – Part Two: My Dairy-free Journey

The day my fourth child was born, I took a long swig of my milky tea, swirled it around in my mouth, savored it and then tipped the rest out. Three of my four children had so far been intolerant to dairy and it was a fair bet that my new daughter would be too.

All the Stories Matter: Eyes Wide Open

Eyes Wide Open

Inspiration:

http://storybird.com/iluv/artwork/12-oclock/

 

Mummy:

The sunlight tiptoed through the cracks in the blinds and across the floor into the bedroom, where it gently shook the sleeping mother awake. Her eyes fluttered slowly, taking in her surroundings. She pulled the plump freshly laundered duvet up around her ears for one last goodbye snuggle before sitting up. Reaching over to her husband’s side and grasping empty bed, she instead pinched his pillow. It was quickly folded and shoved behind to prop herself up.

Five-minute Friday - Together

  

I'm joining up with a writing group over at Lisa- Jo Baker's called Five-Minute Friday where the idea is to write for five minutes flat on a prompt posted on her blog.

  

It’s time to silence the inner critic.

It’s time to hush the voice that whines on and on about how you’re no good.

It’s time to cram out the distractions and excuses and take pen to paper, keyboard to screen and write.

This week’s prompt is “Together”

Start

I can see it beginning already. There is a fiery independence in her eyes, in the way she looks at me with just a touch of disdain when my request takes her away from that all too important task she is undertaking. 

Our Together is not forever. 

She is going to move out some day. Sure, her bags are long from packed; she still needs me to help tie her shoes, but our Together is all too limited.  She is beginning to want to find her own way in the world. She doesn’t want Together with me right now. She wants to spend time with her friends, instead of her mother. She is trying out new found powers of negotiation, and beginning to see how her words can control and influence, uplift and encourage. I reach out and find myself rebuffed; a year ago that never would have happened. 

But for now we are Together, albeit a brief moment in time, in those precious moments before bed when she is tucked up safely, protected from wearies of life and love and expectations. In those precious moments, where she again reaches for me and my loving arms. Each day more and more, I need to grab Together with both hands and clasp it tightly. Together is a precious, non-renewable resource and each drop must be savored, appreciated and drained completely.

Stop

All the Stories Matter: Illumination

Illumination

 Inspiration:

"Proud to Be" By Marias Ideas

Mummy: 

Click, click, click. “Over here sir” The photographers just couldn’t get enough of him. Since the surprise success of his first movie, he had been reveling in the attention that sudden fame had brought with it. They slowly walked the plush red carpet, stopping to pose every few paces. With every step his shoulders pulled back a little further, his head a little higher. He was positively strutting.  The grey streaks in his hair gleamed silver in the flashes and his normally green eyes were oily deep black pools, matching his black tails. The cobalt blue velvet of his vest seemed like downy feathers and she could barely restrain herself from reaching out and touching it in amazement. So unlike anything he would have worn previously. He looked radiant in his finery, his proud headdress fittingly exotic for a masquerade ball. He raised his feathered mask to his face, and she no longer recognized him. 

Going Dairy-Free (DF) – Part One: The Essentials

Going Dairy-Free (DF) – Part One: The Essentials

If you are at your wits end with a breastfed baby that is uncomfortable and gassy, fussy, has reflux or spills excessively, there is a good chance that cutting dairy from your diet may help reduce your baby’s discomfort.  Does the thought frighten you? I want to let you know that going dairy-free can actually be quite simple, you don’t need to miss out on the food comforts you rely on, and that the improvements may very well be worth the effort.

Five-minute Friday - Laundry

  

Today I'm joining up with a writing group over at Lisa- Jo Baker's called Five-Minute Friday where the idea is to write for five minutes flat on a prompt posted on her blog.

  

It’s time to silence the inner critic.

It’s time to hush the voice that whines on and on about how you’re no good.

It’s time to cram out the distractions and excuses and take pen to paper, keyboard to screen and write.

This week’s prompt is “Laundry.”

Start

Today I should be doing laundry. I should be feeding the ravenous metal monster that is never satisfied. I should be controlling that mutating, growing pile in the corner. I should also be cleaning the dishes that have accumulated in my much less than immaculate kitchen. I should have been doing 101 other things that will still be there tomorrow whether I do them today or not.

Belief (#captureyourgrief)

The CAPTURE YOUR GRIEF Photographic Challenge from CarlyMarie Project Heal is part of Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month – October 2013 and I am making it more personal for me by taking a photo and then using it to create a short story. - See more at: http://www.thisisawand.com/search/label/%23captureyourgrief#sthash.MAmYkr59.dpuf

The CAPTURE YOUR GRIEF Photographic Challenge from CarlyMarie Project Heal is part of Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month – October 2013 and I am making it more personal for me by taking a photo and then using it to create a short story. - See more at: http://www.thisisawand.com/search/label/%23captureyourgrief#sthash.MAmYkr59.dpuf

Belief

The little fairy figurine sat pride of place in the shop window, amongst cheap molded plastic and soft toys that had seen better days. The harsh fluorescent lights did her no favors, hiding her true beauty under a white unforgiving glare, but if you looked closely you could still see she was a treasure. The fine porcelain had a luminescent quality, no matter the light source and the deftly sculpted features were delicate and ethereal. This led weight to the belief that the fairy had not been fashioned by hurried hands in substandard buildings in far off lands, but instead born from a marriage of cautiously measured exotic ingredients and whispered words of power.  When seen from the corner of an eye, the delicate wings seemed to flitter for a moment. The miniature wand was large with untapped promise, of wishes and spells asking to be fulfilled if only someone would believe enough. The fairy’s dress was the exactitude of a white calla lily, so vital and alive until you reached to caress it only to find it hard and cold. Whatever force was keeping her so imprisoned was unseen, and at any moment it seemed as though the spell could break and she would leave, flying out the door to wherever she was needed most. In plain sight of the girls and boys that ran past each day busy with important tasks such as spending their last two dollars on lollies or buying a card for their mother’s birthday, the fairy waited.

(Not So) Messy Play Ideas for Toddlers

10 (Not So) Messy Play Ideas for Toddlers (and Mothers with OCD Tendencies).

I have a confession. I hate Messy play. I am constantly worried about the mess they have already made, the mess they are currently making and any potential mess that is still to be made. Finger-painting gives me the shivers, mud makes me queasy, and gloop sends me into full-blown panic attacks. I fully realise that my children suffer for my insecurities. Their creativity is being squashed and their chance to explore the world squandered.  But I find it hard to deliberately make more mess when I already clean up so much through out the day! 

So I made a plan to do some NOT SO messy play with them. 

Five Minute Friday - Ordinary

Today I'm joining up with a writing group over at Lisa- Jo Baker's called Five-Minute Friday where the idea is to write for five minutes flat on a prompt posted on her blog.

  

It’s time to silence the inner critic.

It’s time to hush the voice that whines on and on about how you’re no good.

It’s time to cram out the distractions and excuses and take pen to paper, keyboard to screen and write.

This week’s prompt is “Ordinary.”

Start

We are all just so ordinary. Ordinary people performing ordinary tasks on ordinary days. How is it that some people stand out, some tasks, events, days become more special than others? Do some perform these ordinary task with a little more sparkle, a little more finesse. Or is it that their attitude towards these tasks is better? An ordinary task can become extraordinary if you are excited to perform it.

All the Stories Matter: Blue

Blue.

Inspiration:

Doodlemum (Angie Stevens) - A Thorny Issue 

 Mummy:

The soft full berries burst delightfully as she squeezed them between her thumb and forefinger. Squish, squash, squashed. The juice was staining her fingers and hands an amusing shade of royal blue and she imagined her mouth and chin were a similar hue, with all the berries she had already consumed. Defiant, she wiped her hands on her t-shirt and watched a blue smear emerge and diffuse across the white cotton. Delighted at her recklessness, she laughed and popped another blueberry into her mouth with child-like glee. She could eat as many as she wanted, she thought with a smile. No one to tell her no, her blue eyes glinted at the possibilities. No more do this. No more no don’t do that. 

BTPT: Children's Birthday Interview Book

Been There, Pinned That, Changed My Life : Children’s Birthday Interview Book

It’s true that children say some of the cutest things. My Facebook feed is often filled with my children's and my friends' children's' cutesy sayings and conversations. Sadly Facebook has no “Preserve for All Eternity” button, and these wonderful moments in time are long forgotten as soon as they disappear from the news feed.

When I saw this pin, I thought this would be a fabulous idea to start a birthday book for each of my girls preserving a brief snapshot in time that they could look back on to get an idea of who they were, what they liked and disliked, and what was important to them, and earn a *Super Mummy Star*in the process.

Five Minute Friday - Write

Today I'm joining up with a writing group over at Lisa- Jo Baker's called Five-Minute Friday where the idea is to write for five minutes flat on a prompt posted on her blog.

  

It’s time to silence the inner critic.

It’s time to hush the voice that whines on and on about how you’re no good.

It’s time to cram out the distractions and excuses and take pen to paper, keyboard to screen and write.

This week’s prompt is “WRITE.”

Start

Sometimes we think we are in charge of our lives. We go about our business making our choices, deciding our own fate. Then something happens that makes it all too apparent we are not the one in charge. Someone connects the dots for us and that connection between insignificant moments is divine. Moments like puzzle pieces floating in chaos soup, when two pieces join and for a brief instant we see the bigger picture. A god moment.

All the Stories Matter: Always the Same

As it was my daughter's writing that inspired me to put “pen to paper” (never so figuratively as it has now become), I want to keep collaborating and sharing our love of writing fiction.

So we have decided to regularly write a creative short story based on the same inspiration. Here is our first collaboration:  Growth

- See more at: http://www.thisisawand.com/search/label/All%20the%20Stories%20Matter#sthash.zml3SlZT.dpuf

As it was my daughter's writing that inspired me to put “pen to paper” (never so figuratively as it has now become), I want to keep collaborating and sharing our love of writing fiction.

So we have decided to regularly write a creative short story based on the same inspiration. Here is our first collaboration:  Growth

- See more at: http://www.thisisawand.com/search/label/All%20the%20Stories%20Matter#sthash.zml3SlZT.dpuf

As it was my daughter's writing that inspired me to put “pen to paper” (never so figuratively as it has now become), I want to keep collaborating and sharing our love of writing fiction.

So we have decided to regularly write a creative short story based on the same inspiration. Here is our first collaboration:  Growth

- See more at: http://www.thisisawand.com/search/label/All%20the%20Stories%20Matter#sthash.v4tHXvUo.dpuf

As it was my daughter's writing that inspired me to put “pen to paper” (never so figuratively as it has now become), I want to keep collaborating and sharing our love of writing fiction.

So we have decided to regularly write a creative short story based on the same inspiration. Here is our first collaboration:  Growth

- See more at: http://www.thisisawand.com/search/label/All%20the%20Stories%20Matter#sthash.v4tHXvUo.dpuf

Always the Same

Inspiration:

Ad infinitum by Doodlemum (Angie Stevens)
 

 

Mummy:

She sat in front of the broken washing machine pulling out soaking wet clothes. It wasn’t meant to be like this thought Moana. She fished out a sodden little turquoise and red sock with goldfish on it and looked at it closely. It belonged to her youngest, Aroha. Four children later, how had it come to this? She slipped in the foam and dropped to the floor, beaten, broken, mentally exhausted, without the strength to stand and face this next challenge. Her pasty white legs slid around on the wet concrete and she curled them around under her. It had been so long since they had seen the sun or sand, their coppery golden glean long gone, and as for pretty painted nails, well… she laughed to herself. Trying less than half-heartedly to stand, she flopped around in the foamy water and the tears began to fall. Salty smears across her cheeks, falling to meet the foam on the floor, where they sat like little gems. Sapphire, pounamu, aquamarine, turquoise, paua.  Colours of the sea now missing from her life. She had given up those along with wild waves and sandy shores for love when she had moved from the cove to the modern suburbia she found herself now living.

Identity (#captureyourgrief)

Identity

 

 CAPTURE YOUR GRIEF Photographic Challenge from CarlyMarie Project Heal is part of Pregnancy and Infant Loss Awareness Month – October 2013 and I am making it more personal for me by taking a photo and then using it to create a short story. - See more at: http://www.thisisawand.com/search/label/%23capturethegrief#sthash.Q7gXbzm1.dpuf

“I used to take these two at a time” She thought out loud with a tinge of bitterness as she stared down the steps to the beach below.  Their steepness and height now brought with them a vague sense of vertigo and she could barely manage them at all, only with the help of  the recently installed handrail her son-in-law had insisted on. “We’re just worried about you Mum” he had justified, attempting to soothe her wounded pride when the workman had just turned up out of the blue, but she knew that it was really all about the resale value.  And she had told him so too, angrily slamming the phone down. Still she had conceded to it, and now the handrail was a blight on the landscape. Down on the dunes beside the path, the marram grass hadn’t recovered sufficiently to camouflage it, after the rude trampling it had endured.

Inspirations: Doodlemum AKA Angie Stevens

I have been introduced to our second artist Doodlemum AKA Angie Stevens. Thanks to Mairead! Again, some wonderful inspiration for our short story writing! 

Sunrise (#captureyourgrief)

Sunrise

The day after it happened, Doc woke up with the sun. He reached out each limb, carefully and deliberately stretching and limbering one after the other, for these were the tools of his trade and he had to look after them. His chiseled, hard-as-rock muscles were not the result of hours at the gym pumping iron, but instead were built the old-fashioned way – pushing iron - shovels, axes and picks in endless pursuit of precious metals. Work in the mines was hard but rewarding. He felt the ache each night, oh boy did he feel that ache, but woke each morning renewed and ready to do it all over again. Work was not some mental escape from reality, nor was it just a means to an end, but a real reason to get up each morning.